Class 3: The Urban Experience . The cities that existed were traditionally official buildings or important local markets · Cities were built by plan, 'model cities', which were uniform with a square structure incl. church, market - by Peter and Catherine the Great . The model was St Petersburg Connected boulevards similar to Manhattan (numbered streets) Under Catherine the Great, every city was built using stone · Port cities were very important to export grain - main trading cities with harbours · Russia had two capitals - Moscow (grew organically around the Kremlin) and St Petersburg (16th May 1703 - the birth of the city) Tension between the two capitals, those who favour either one Petersburg is more delicate and refined - the brain of Russia; Moscow is the heartland · 1860s and industrialisation witnesses the emergence of the middle class O The emergence of consumer culture e.g. Shops, adverts The rise of proletariat - peasants turned into factory workers and moved to the cities to make a living there · The urban experience o Something very different and makes you react in a specific way - jaw- dropping, modern technology o Class is a very abstract concept · What sources do we have? o The educated, literate . Those who take photographs or take sketches Police records of what people were doing, how they were behaving Perspective of the author: nobility in St Petersburg in 1820s lived in a very secluded area; they did not know anything beyond downtown; streetlife did not exist as they lived in their coach; the city was not a sociological concept, but a standard of living, normal day life of the salon and possibly the court; the country estate was resided in summer but still there would be no interaction between the village o The city enters the mind of the people - (a) changes in the real world (b) perceptions of the people change to identify the 'other', an awareness of otherness
The elites in the cities realise that there is something beyond the salon, beyond the court - and so comes a change in perception o Different levels of civilisation e.g. Paved streets in the centre vs mud streets in the suburbs o 19th century: associated with a literary phenomenon (important vehicle of social issues) called a 'quest for reality' - people attempted to view the city in an objective way along the line of natural sciences, to view it systematically " The city was understood to be a mechanical body, with a unique system Categorisation of the city To understand the city and reduce it to its essence - in literature e.g. Statistics Literary and journalistic business Differences in urban space and society were recognised by journalistic writers - the flaneur (wanderer) were typically men and were allowed to cross borders/ margins, both literally and figuratively, and wrote about their experiences in neighbourhoods which others would not dream about entering as well as the lives of the people there " The